Michael S. Hart
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Michael Stern Hart (b. 1947 in Tacoma, Washington) is an American best known as the founder of Project Gutenberg (PG) which makes electronic books freely available via the Internet. At least one version of each book is a plain text file that can be displayed on virtually any computer. Most of the early postings were personally typed in by himself. Today, the e-texts are produced (usually scanned) by Project Gutenberg's many volunteers. The collection includes public domain works and copyrighted works included with express permission.
Contents |
[edit] Early life
Michael Hart's father was an accountant and his mother, a former cryptanalyst during World War II, was a business manager at a retail store. In 1958 his family relocated to Urbana, Illinois, and his father and mother became college professors in Shakespearean studies and mathematics education, respectively. Hart attended the University of Illinois, completing an independent-study program focused on human/machine interfaces in just two years to receive his bachelor's degree. He then attended but did not complete graduate school.
[edit] Birth of the project
During Hart's time there, the University of Illinois computer center gave Hart a user's account on its computer system. (Hart's brothers' friend was the mainframe operator.) Although the focus of computer use there tended to be data processing, Hart was aware that it was connected to a network (part of what would become the Internet) and chose also to use his computer time for information distribution. Hart related that after his account was created on July 4, 1971, he had been trying to think of what to do with it and had seized upon a copy of the United States Declaration of Independence, which he had been given at a grocery store on his way home from watching fireworks that evening. He typed the text into a teletype machine but was unable to transmit it via e-mail. Thus, to avoid "crashing the system", it had to be downloaded individually.
This was the beginning of Project Gutenberg. Hart began posting text copies of such classics as the Bible, the works of Homer, Shakespeare, and Mark Twain. As of 1987 he had typed in a total of 313 books in this fashion. Then, through being involved in the University of Illinois PC User Group and with assistance from Mark Zinzow, a programmer at the school, Hart was able to recruit volunteers and set up an infrastructure of mirror sites and mailing lists for the project. With this the project was able to grow much more rapidly.
[edit] Anti-copyright extensions
 |
The neutrality of this section is disputed. Please see the discussion on the talk page. |
As the founder of Project Gutenberg, Hart was approached about being the lead plaintiff in the protest case that eventually became Eldred v. Ashcroft. However, Hart's desire to focus on attacking the greed of copyright owners in legal briefs for the case was resisted by attorney Lawrence Lessig. Hart related that he only wanted to attach a personal statement of his views in an appendix and tried for months to draft a suitable statement. Lessig finally said it would not be included and so Hart withdrew from participation.[citation needed]
[edit] The writer
Hart is also an author and his works are available free of charge on the Project Gutenberg server.
See also History of the Internet.
[edit] References
- Levy, Steven. "Lawrence Lessig's Supreme Showdown". Wired, October 2002.
